R. L. Garner

“ They look in silence, turning their little heads from side to side, as if to be certain it is not an illusion. They nudge one another again, and move up an inch or two closer, squinting their bright eyes, as if in doubt about the strange sight before them. They have made such calls before, but have not quite determined what kind of an animal this is in the cage. ”

“ Whether animals feel the same degree of mental and physical pain as man or not, they do, in these tragic moments, evince a certain amount of concern for one another, which imparts a tinge of sympathy that must appeal to any one who is not devoid of every sense of mercy.
It is true that it is often difficult, and sometimes impossible, to secure the young by other means; but the manner of getting them often mars the pleasure of having them, and while Aaron was, to me, a charming pet and a valuable subject for study, I confess the story of his capture always touched me in a tender spot. ”

“ The birds are tiresome and monotonous. Yonder is a small snake twined around the limb of a bushy tree. He is doubtless hunting for a nest of young birds. The low, muttering sound of distant thunder is heard, but little by little it grows louder. It is the familiar voice of the tornado. ”

“ Our passions are not moved by visible forces nor measured by fixed units: they disdain all laws of logic, and spurn the narrow bounds of reason; they obey no code of ethics that can be defined, and conform to no theory of action.
As soon as I saw this little ape I expressed a desire to own him, so the trader in charge bought him and presented him to me. As it was intended that he should be the friend and ally of Moses, although not his brother, we conferred upon him the name of Aaron, as the two names are so intimately associated in history that the mention of one always suggests the other. ”

“ The eyes of the gorilla are large, dark, and expressive, but there is no trace of white in them. That part of the eye which is white in man is a dark coffee-brown in the gorilla, but becomes lighter as it approaches the base of the optic nerve. The taxidermist or the artist, who often furnishes him with a white spot in the corner of his eye, does violence to the subject; and those who pose the animal with his mouth open like a fly-trap, and his arms raised like a lancer, ought to be banished from good society. ”

“ One look at the portrait of Aaron will impress any one with the high mental qualities of this little captive, but to see and study him in life would convince a heretic of his superior character. In every look and gesture there was a touch of the human that no one could fail to observe. ”

“ It must not be understood that all of these apes do not frequently climb, even to the tops of the highest trees; but that is not their normal mode of life any more than the top of a mast is the proper place on a ship for a sailor.
The chimpanzee is nomadic in habit, and, like the gorilla, seldom or never passes two nights in the same spot. As to his building huts or nests in trees or elsewhere, I am not prepared to believe that he ever does so. I hunted in vain, for months, and made diligent inquiry in several tribes, but failed to find a specimen of any kind of shelter built by an ape. ”

“ We have already noticed the fact that the gorilla is confined by nature to a low, humid region, reeking with miasma and the effluvia of decaying vegetation. The atmosphere in which he thrives is one in which human life can hardly exist. We know in part why man cannot live in such an atmosphere and under such conditions, but we cannot say with certainty why the ape does do so. It would seem that the very element that is fatal to the life of man gives strength and vitality to the gorilla. ”

“ Almost every yarn told by the novice is quite the same in substance and much the same in detail as those related by others. It seems that most of them meet the same old gorilla, still beating his breast and screaming just as he did thirty years ago. The number of gun-barrels that he is accused of having chewed up would make an arsenal that would arm the volunteers. What becomes of all those that are attacked by this fierce monarch of the jungle? Not one of them ever gets killed, and not one of them ever kills a gorilla. ”

“ He is the only one I have seen that can use a knife and fork with very much skill, but he cuts up his food with almost as much ease as a boy of the same age would do, and uses his fork in eating. He has been taught to do this until he rarely uses his fingers in the act. He is fond of coffee and beer, but does not care for spirits.
There is nothing that so much delights Consul as to get into the large cage of monkeys and baboons kept in the garden. Most of them are afraid of him. But one large Guinea baboon is not, and on every occasion he shows his dislike for the ape. ”

“ Within the family circle of the chimpanzee the father is supreme; but he does not degrade his royalty by being a tyrant. Each member of the family seems to have certain rights that are not impugned by others. For example, possession is the right of ownership. When one ape procures a certain article of food, the others do not try to dispossess it. It is from this source, doubtless, that man inherits the idea of private ownership. ”

“ As no literal formula can be made to represent the phonetic elements of the speech of chimpanzees, I have taken a new step in the art of writing by framing a system of my own, which is rational in plan and simple in device.
The organs of speech always act in harmony, and a certain movement of the lips is always attended by a certain movement of the internal organs of speech. This is true of the ape as well as of man, and in order to utter the same sounds each would employ the same organs, and use them in the same way. ”

“ The type of the skull is peculiar, and combines to a certain extent more human-like form in one part with a more beast-like form in another. The usual height of an adult male is about fifty-one inches.
I have never had an opportunity of studying this ape in a wild state, and have only had access to four of them in captivity, all of which were young and most of them inferior specimens. He is the most obtuse or stupid of the four great apes. And were it not for his skeleton alone he would be assigned a place below the gibbon, for in point of speech and mental calibre he is far inferior. ”

“ I have no light of any kind, for that would alarm the inhabitants of the jungle, and attract a vast army of insects from all quarters. Moses and the boy are fast asleep, while I sit and listen to the many strange and weird sounds heard in the jungle at night The bush crackles near by. It is a leopard creeping through it. He is coming this way. Slowly, cautiously he approaches. I cannot see him in the deep shadows of the foliage, but I can locate him by sound, and identify him by his peculiar tread. Perhaps he will attack the cage when he gets near enough. He is creeping up closer. ”

“ In the social life of the gorilla there are a few things perhaps that differ very much from that of the chimpanzee, but there are some that do in a certain degree. From the native accounts of the modes of life of these two apes, there would appear to be a much greater difference than a systematic study of them reveals; but the native version of things frequently has a germ of truth which may serve as a clue to the facts in the case; and while we cannot rely upon the tales they relate in all details, we can forgive the mendacity and make use of the suggestion they furnish. ”

“ MAN AND APE COMPARED
Monkeys have always been a subject of idle interest to old and young; but they have usually served to amuse the masses more than to instruct them, until within recent years.
Now that science has brought them within the field of careful research, and made them an object of serious study, it has invested them with a certain dignity in the esteem of mankind, and imparted to them a new aspect among animals. ”

“ There is no fixed type that will represent all kinds of monkeys.
Within the limits of their own family they present a great variety of types, but the one marked difference between them as a unit, and the ape as another, is, that the spinal column of the monkey is always extended into a tail, the first vertebra of which is joined to the base of the sacrum, while the ape has no tail, but the spinal column terminates with a small pointed bone called the coccyx, exactly the same as in man. ”

“ Their modes of life are so unlike, as to afford no common unit of measure. Their faculties are developed along different lines. The two have but few problems in common to solve. While the scope of the human mind is vastly wider than that of the ape, it does not follow that it can act with more precision in all things. There are, perhaps, instances in which the mind of the ape excels that of man, by reason of its adaptation to certain conditions. It is not a safe and infallible guide to measure all things by the standard of man's opinion of himself. ”

“ It is not at all rare to see a vast difference of manners, intelligence, and temperament among specimens that belong to one species. In these respects they vary as much in proportion to their mental scope as human beings do; but I have never seen, in any two apes of the same species, the two extremes so widely removed from one another.
While waiting at Gaboon for a steamer I had my own cage erected for them to live in, as it was large and gave them ample room for play and exercise. ”

“ It was a bad thing to teach an ape, because they grow pugnacious as they grow older, and all animals kept closely confined acquire a bad temper.
In an adjoining cage was kept a young orang, and the two ate at the same table. The chimpanzee appeared to entertain a species of contempt for the orang. The keeper had taught him to pass the bread to his neighbour, and he obeyed this with such reluctance that his manner betrayed more disgust than kindness. ”

“ Animals may be taught to do many things in a mechanical way, and without any motive that relates to the action; but when they can work out the solution without the aid of man, it is only the faculty of reason that can guide them.
One thing that Aaron could never figure out was what became of the chimpanzee that he saw in a mirror. I have seen him hunt for that mysterious ape for an hour at a time, and he broke a piece off a mirror I had in trying to find it, but he never succeeded. ”

“ The gorilla has good ears, good eyes, and is a skilful bushman. One man walking through the jungle will make more noise than half a dozen gorillas. The gorilla can always see and hear a man before he is seen or heard by him. He is shy, and will not attack a man unless he is disturbed by him.249 He is always on the alert for danger, and rarely comes into the open parts of the bush except for food. He can conceal himself with more ease than a man can, and has every advantage in making his escape. I do not believe that he will ever approach a man if he can evade him. ”

“ The food of the gorilla is not confined to plants and fruits. They are fond of meat, and eat it either raw or cooked. They secure a small supply by catching rodents of various kinds, lizards and toads; they are also known to rob the nests of birds of the eggs, and of the young. A native once pointed out to me the quills and bones of a porcupine which he said had been left by a gorilla who had eaten the carcass, and he said that it was not at all rare for them to do so. The fruits and plants they live upon chiefly are acidulous in taste, and some of them are bitter. ”